


something like a sunburst.

by thychesters



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Birds of Prey (Comic), Nightwing (Comics)
Genre: Cunnilingus, F/M, Kissing, Making Out on the Couch ayyyy, Vaginal Sex, and my brain said ‘bold of you to assume i was going to let you ignore this’, and then on the bed, i figured i'd get to it eventually, i jotted down a vague outline that popped into my head one night, nervous dickbabs, so here we are like 10k later, time for oracle to get LAID FOLKS, to which the nick miller in me went ‘what do you mean’, welp here we are
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-16
Updated: 2020-09-16
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:08:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26488444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thychesters/pseuds/thychesters
Summary: once, barbara said she needed time and dick said he could give her that. she needed time to think, to consider, to be ready. and then, she thinks, when she sees him again, maybe this time she is, maybe they are.there's too much emotion; it's too raw, too deep, and tonight, she decides, it's something to lose themselves in.(dick spends the night at barbara's. what begins as a cordial visit goes far beyond that.)
Relationships: Barbara Gordon/Dick Grayson
Comments: 14
Kudos: 90





	something like a sunburst.

**Author's Note:**

> hey so i wrote some more dickbabs smut because frankly? it's what oracle deserves. this was an idea i jotted down and very much so spiraled, as things always do with me. this is something a little more outside my wheelhouse, since in most writing i either allude to sex or it's mentioned in passing, so this is me stretching my creative muscles (and dick his physical, because heyoooo)
> 
> set in some vague time period after tkj and her telling dick she needed more time (and then proceeded to make out with him but whatever, barbara)
> 
> shout out to pen too, for once again looking things over!

Dick shows up at her apartment at 9:02, and Barbara can’t help a smile as she opens the door to find him doing the same. He looks a little more nervous and there’s a glint in his eye she can’t quite decipher before it fades. His chin ducks into his jacket collar, the arm that doesn’t have his motorcycle helmet tucked under it raising in a weak gesture, jostling the bag and small bundle of sunflowers he’s holding.

“You’re late,” Barbara says, raising an eyebrow. There’s no heat to it, and Dick shuffles minutely under her gaze.

“Only by two minutes,” he returns. “And I brought flowers. And wine.” His gaze cuts from them and back to her as his brow draws together. “Unless… you don’t like wine. I could have gotten beer, or tea. Or nothing.”

“Calm down, Nervous Wonder,” she chides, moving aside to let him in. She closes the door behind him and he lets out a sigh as he comes to stand in the middle of her entryway. “I like wine.”

“Damn, I was hoping you were gonna say no so I could keep it all to myself,” he mutters, setting his helmet down on the counter by the fridge as she gestures and leads him deeper into her apartment. Barbara just about snorts. With her back to him she sets about digging out a vase for the flowers and there’s another small thud on the counter and crinkle of paper as he pulls out a bottle of wine.

“I do have a bottle of vodka in the freezer I could entertain myself with, I suppose,” she says, turning to find Dick shucking his jacket and leaving it hanging on the back of one of the kitchen chairs. “Second cabinet on your right.”

He nods and she eyes what she can see of the wine label as she arranges the sunflowers. She also eyes him as he pulls out her wine glasses, but he doesn’t need to know that.

“So what did you bring me?”

Dick grins, a lopsided sort of thing that exposes his teeth as he takes the corkscrew she hands him. “Always so demanding. I brought you a nice red; a good vintage, if you will.”

“Ah, so Alfred gave it to you.”

“What? No, I got this one myself,” he says, pulling a face at her as the cork comes free with a small pop. Mature as ever, she sticks her tongue out at him as he pours her a glass. Their fingers brush with something like a jolt, but it’s hard to determine the look in his eye when he looks away. “Even sprung for the cork—no screw tops for us.”

“How fancy.” Barbara reaches over to clink her glass against his, and watches as some of the tension appears to bleed from his shoulders as a result. The way he holds himself isn’t his usual fashion, something she decides she’ll keep on eye on for the time being as she takes a sip of her wine.

Dick drums his fingers on the lip of the kitchen island, humming, and then she sits up and tells him to follow her—and bring the wine.

They set themselves up on the veranda, a rooftop view of a city that spreads, rolling down toward the horizon and forever reaching toward an untouchable sky. She rests her wine glass on the brickwork, Dick perched dangerously on the edge as he glances down to the hustle of the nightlife below, and she leans back in her chair to watch him for a moment. A lukewarm breeze catches her hair, blowing too-long bangs into her eyes and tousling his from where they’ve grown out, down over his ears and almost to his shoulders. It’s a look that suits him, she thinks, and then he turns to look back down at her.

Barbara shakes her head as she shifts the brakes on her chair, and it takes some maneuvering until she’s settled on the lip beside him, legs dangling over the edge of the roof in a mimicry of years ago, and if she closes her eyes she’s there again, finding a reprieve in a night of patrol and the wind caught in her hair as she propels herself, trusting enough in him to catch her. She opens them to find Dick fallen into a crouch, and then sits beside her as he mirrors her.

“Nice night,” he murmurs. “Quiet.”

“For now,” she muses, allowing her gaze to wander.

His scoff is light as he shakes his head, and he allows his wine glass to dangle from his fingertips, high above the streets of Old Gotham as he swings his feet. She eyes his profile in both the artificial and natural light, what little is left, colors bleeding across the horizon in bursts of deep blues and deeper purples. His eyelashes are longer than she remembers, the cut of his jaw sharper, and she remembers everything. 

She remembers his minute hesitation that one night, just before he left, standing on her fire escape with a pinch in his brow, a look in his eye like he was going to ask something he never had the words for. Barbara can remember the ghost of his breath, the way hers had caught as he leaned toward her and then veered at the last second, the trace of his lips against her cheek and the beginnings of stubble on his and then he’d been gone.

Part her wishes he hadn’t. Part of her still does.

“If you keep staring long enough I might do a backflip,” he says with a glint of teeth as he raises her glass.

Spots of color form high up her cheeks and she twists away, hoping to hide them in the shadows and curtain of hair from what’s fallen loose from the bun she dragged it into. Dick’s still grinning as he takes a sip and swallows, and she watches his throat work out of the corner of her eye and chides herself for it.

“And here I thought you might do something useful,” she mutters into her own glass, letting the acidity of the wine coat her tongue and linger for a moment. Dick’s smile is just as bright as ever, even in the artificial twilight.

“Ouch.”

Together they sit in silence for a minute, one that’s comfortable, the occasional scrap of glass against brick and life below the only thing to break it.

“I feel like I haven’t been here in forever,” Dick finally says, and Barbara watches his bangs sway in the breeze as she turns back to face him. “The city, I mean. I’m no stranger to hanging out with Bruce or Tim, on patrol or outside of it, but… sometimes I don’t recognize it, y’know? Maybe it’s because I spent so much time in Blüdhaven, but there’s something about Gotham that almost feels like a stranger—familiar, but like a name I can’t place.”

Barbara sets her glass back down. “I think I get it, in a way. Sometimes you take a step away and come back to view things in a new lense, and nothing looks the same anymore. I spend most of my time watching the world through screens, you do from up in the air. By the time we reach the ground the perspectives have shifted.”

From the corner of her eye she can tell he’s looking at her, head tilted and gaze trailing over her profile in a way she tries to ignore.

“We spent so much time as kids thinking about how much we could change the city for the better, and we’ve spent what, a decade trying? And then one day you’re an adult and look back and realize there are some things you can’t change, some things you have to live with and make the best out of.”

Dick takes a sip from his glass. She gives him a look.

“You sure we’re talking about the same thing here?” The corner of his lip is barely raised, and her brow puckers as their eyes meet.

She hums, “We could be.”

She holds out her glass as he raises the bottle, wine sloshing around it before she makes a small noise in the back of her throat to signal enough. He’s quiet again, considering, and Barbara elects to wait, not to push, for him to voice what’s on his mind.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there,” he murmurs, his voice a soft whisper in the night air between them, and something inside of Barbara bristles with an ache she’d rather not think about.

“We don’t have to talk about it,” she says by way of saying _don’t._ The hand holding Dick’s wine glass drops back between his knees, and she thinks of how she doesn’t want an apology for that, either. She’s tired of apologies, and empty ones at that. 

“Then we won’t,” he says, matter of factly. Dick leans back a bit, propping his elbow up on where the brickwork raises toward a half wall. It’s quiet again, and Barbara works her jaw before he speaks again. “What are you doing?”

“Just thinking.”

“Clearly.” 

“Oh _okay_.” There’s little bite in her tone, and she can tell how little it fazes him by the way he holds himself, the picture of languid ease and muscle against brick, though she knows all of his senses are on high alert and she forces herself to look away lest he catch her staring again. Barbara transfers her glass to her other hand in order to reach behind her and prop herself up. “About Gotham. Bruce. My dad. Us. Batgirl and Robin.” 

“The dynamic duo?” he asks, glass fogging up as he speaks into it, voice garbled by wine. It takes everything in her not to laugh and knock the bottom of the glass with her hand so he spills the rest on himself.

“Nah, that was you and Bruce; I just third wheeled for a while, but I really made it work.”

“Are you kidding?” Dick comes back with, and Barbara turns to find a furrow marring the skin of his brow, corners of his mouth turned down in a frown. His wine glass sits poised against his lip, and he takes another quick sip before he continues. “You were like the glue that kept the operation going for a minute there—and no, it wasn’t just because I thought you were cute, no matter what Bruce says.”

“Aw, you thought I was cute,” she says with a grin as she leans into his space, wine swirling around her glass. “That’s adorable. I suppose someone had to be the brains of the outfit.”

“Don’t tell Bruce that,” he says as he refills his glass. 

She laughs, and then they sit in comfortable silence for a while, eased by heady wine and a sense of familiar camaraderie. Barbara lists into his space unknowingly, brickwork digging into the heel of her palm and her hair trailing along his shoulder. They say nothing, sipping at wine and watching the occasional star peek through the clouds and smog in the sky. Still, she can tell Dick has something else in his mind, body held in such a way there have to be words bubbling up to the surface soon enough.

She takes another sip of wine and closes her eyes.

“For the record, I always thought you were cute,” he says, breath in the shell of her ear, and when Barbara turns she has to tilt her head to look up at him, eyes too bright in the dark and staring into hers, too honest and open, and she almost has to look away. “More than that, even. You’re beautiful, Barbara.”

His head tilts, as does hers like it’s instinctual, and it’s…

He’s close, too close, and the wall she’s put between them comes creeping back up.

It would be too easy to bridge the gap between them, and perhaps that is what frightens her most.

“It’s getting late,” she says as she leans back, turning away so she doesn’t have to see his expression like the coward she feels like. Whether he’s crestfallen, whether he’s disappointed, whether he’s nothing at all she doesn’t know, isn’t sure if she wants to. “It isn’t often we get a night off, and you could probably use the rest.”

“Shit, Barbara, I’m sorry,” he says, but she’s already moving away from the ledge and back to her chair. He gathers up their glasses and she waves off his hand as she maneuvers back into her chair, grounded and in control. “I…”

“It’s fine, Dick,” she says, tone too forcibly light, and Barbara chides herself for what was an otherwise enjoyable evening turning into… this. “You can stay the night if you want to,” she says over her shoulder as Dick follows her back inside. “Not that I don’t think you’re not capable of driving, or that I doubt you, but…”

Barbara gestures vaguely toward the rest of the living room area as the sliding glass door clicks shut behind them. She finally turns to face Dick, who only looks bemused as she hooks a thumb over her shoulder and says: “The couch is comfier than it looks, I promise. I’ve spent many a night myself on it—there’s the drool pillow and everything.” 

“I’ll just flip it over,” he says with a grin, and it’s some weight off her shoulders now that some semblance of their night is salvageable.

“Oh no, the other side is _much_ worse.”

Dick laughs and makes his way back to the kitchen with their empty glasses and emptier bottle, and she sets to work busying herself with finding him bedding and sleep clothes. What she finds instead, buried at the bottom drawer of her dresser are borrowed clothes of his, a Gotham Knights shirt he loaned her eons ago she simply never gave back, and a pair of sweatpants she’d grabbed by mistake once and neglected to return.

She bites back a remark about procuring him clothes from her multitude of consorts (of which there are… few) at the sight of Dick, totally unabashed, already taking his shirt off before she can hand him his pajamas.

“I was wondering where this went,” he says, and Barbara averts her gaze.

“Yeah, well, I meant to give that back to you at some point. Now seemed about as good a time as any.” She catches a hint of teeth when she glances up at him, and he shrugs before tugging his shirt over his head. “On that note… thank you again for the wine, and good night, Dick.”

Dick’s gaze is soft, and his voice softer when he says: “good night, Babs,” and she isn’t too sure what to think about that.

She mulls it over as she brushes her teeth, and again still as she sets her glasses on the nightstand and changes into her own pajamas. Barbara gives her pillow a good stare down as she pulls back the covers, and then pauses even as instinct screams at her not to. Her fingers toys with the ends of her sleeves, mindless, and she listens with rapt attention to the sounds of Dick settling in for the evening amidst those of the rest of the Clocktower; the click of the lamp being shut off, the gears shifting above them, and a quiet sigh. She wonders if he’s doing the same, if he’s staring up at the ceiling, considering, or if he’s simply decided to call it a night.

Barbara wars with herself, sure her heart is pounding loud enough he can hear it and glances at the threshold of her bedroom door before she makes up her mind.

He’s still awake, because of course he is and she knows when he’s faking, and she can hear Dick shift on the couch, blanket being kicked aside as he sits up. She meets his eyes, and that only solidifies it, though it does little to soothe her nerves.

“We’re going to regret this,” she says quietly, because to say it any louder only adds to the gravity of the situation.

“Regret what?” he asks from the end of the couch, watching her from halfway across the room as if he has no idea what she’s talking about. Her heart’s about beating in her throat, beaten back self-consciousness creeping up her back and into her shoulders as he watches her round the couch. Dick sits up enough to swing his feet off and plant them on the ground, her chair coming to rest just shy of his toes.

He watches her and she him, though he waits for her to make the next move, to reach back across into that space where he’s already tried to meet her halfway. There his hand is still outstretched, still waiting to see if she’ll make that jump and fall with him.

Barbara watches every contour of his body, line in his face, the scars catching in the light leaking through the blinds as he leans, and something inside of her trembles, threatening to burst into fragments she can never hope to piece back together before it stills.

“It could ruin everything,” she says, and his fingers twitch against the knee of his sweatpants; she imagines them reaching toward her, the way they feel against hers, cradling her arm, the back of her head. Her face burns and his pupils are wide and his eyes dark with something she’s never seen in them before, never aimed at her.

“I’m okay with that,” he whispers, and she says it’s a risk, one they have to be willing to take and can’t take back, and she hardly hears his assent.

And then she leans in to kiss him.

It’s short-lived, chaste, and Barbara pulls away first to find her hands resting against his chest. One of his lingers by her ear, in her hair like it hadn’t had time to decide where to go before she broke away from the kiss.

He lets out a breath like it’s been stolen, and the staccato rhythm her heart’s adopted comes back to rest in her chest, settling.

“Can I?” he asks again, softer this time, in the minuscule space between them as the tips of his fingers ghost along her cheek. Her eyes dart from one of his and then other and back, his gaze held steady. Aside from the steady rise and fall of his chest he doesn’t move, and Barbara takes a breath.

“Yes.”

He’s tentative at first, the barely there brush of his lips against hers, and then growing bolder as he leans back in. His tongue traces along her bottom lip in a silent, hesitant question, and she parts them to allow him in. He tastes like red wine, and Barbara’s hands make it from his shoulders to his hair, the back of his head as it tilts and deepens the kiss. Dick breaks away with a quick glance down, the hand not at her back fallen at her knee, and he shoots a quick glance her way.

“Is this okay?”

“Yes,” she repeats, and then: “For now.” She watches as his palm smooths along her thigh and toward her hip with a phantom sensation that blossoms into one she can feel as his thumb disappears beneath the hem of her shirt, grazing along her hip. She pulls him back in, his breath harsh against her lip, and kisses him deeper now, tongue skimming along his and the edges of teeth, and he groans as she moves closer, tugging at her until she’s out of her chair and in his lap.

He enjoys touching her, she finds as it escalates, as much as she enjoys touching him, though his hands tend to wander dangerously low, and he must sense the barely bitten back remarks from her because they come to settle at her waist again. There are more calluses than she’d thought, but she can imagine their build up from years of trapeze work, followed by years honing it in vigilantism.

He’s warm against her, muscles twitching beneath cotton as her hands wander, roving along his shoulders, down his chest, and his stomach tightens as they move lower. Dick makes a choked sound against her tongue and Barbara pulls back to inquire, mouth red and lips pleasantly sore. 

Before she can say anything he goes to move them, one hand at her hip and the other splayed against her upper back before he’s pressing her against the cushions, into the arm of the couch and twisting his hips away from her.

He does not mask his groan as her fingers drag through his hair and the sweats do little to hide his growing excitement from where it presses against her hip when he shifts to keep her leg from falling off the couch. The brief touch, once it registers, brings with it both nerves and a sense of what she can only consider pride.

“Sorry,” he chokes out, and she feels something like a flash of panic jolting through the both of them. His touch is too much but not enough at the same time, and when she opens her eyes his are slanted, an apology in them as his jaw works. For a moment Barbara doesn’t say anything, doesn’t do anything, which he clearly takes a bad sign and he starts to pull away when her grip tightens, loath to let him go.

“No,” she gets out, throat working as she swallows, and Dick pauses where he’s braced above her. She eyes him for a moment, searching, contending with her own thoughts as she does. “It’s… it’s fine. ‘S good.”

Dick’s gaze roves over hers, body only settling as she releases the fistfuls of his shirt in her grasp, the wrinkled material smoothing out as she runs her hands along it, then tugging him back down to meet her. He finally does only after a moment of hesitation, clearly working through some struggles of his own, and then one of his arms moves above her head to brace himself against the arm of the couch.

“You want this, don’t you?” she asks, something like marvel in a voice barely above a whisper as it resides in the space they’ve created and that alone. She tries to mask the tone, that vindication, and almost has to close her eyes and twist her head away at the thought.

She doesn’t.

“Yes,” he says, with more conviction than she thought he could muster. It carries more weight, now, than it did years before, a lifetime ago, and it dislodges something in her ribcage, an unspoken thought, want, she’s left to lie dormant, her own little secret to cultivate in a garden where it’s never meant to bloom.

“Are you sure about this?” she murmurs, body arching into his touch as Dick’s hand glides along her side.

“You have no idea how bad I want this, want you,” he mumbles against her lips, and it’s everything Barbara can do to catch her breath as he kisses her.

A hand snakes down to palm his crotch, and he grunts. “I think I have some idea.”

She pulls him back down to her, licks her way into the slant of his mouth, and finds his groan is the most beautiful noise she’s ever heard.

“I just got this back.” Dick puts up little fuss as she goes to pull his shirt off, ducking his head and arms catching in the sleeves at the awkward angle. She has no time to let her gaze rove over the expanse of his chest, his stomach, and so lets her hands take over when he bends down to kiss her again. Her fingers dance along his rib cage, down his sides and back, and Dick presses into her like he’s afraid of letting go.

Barbara takes the chance to breathe as his mouth moves to the corner of her jaw, the side of her neck, heart hammering in her chest and the fingers of one hand knotted in the hair at the back of his head.

“Wait, wait,” she says, to which he pulls back immediately and she can see the growing look of trepidation as she catches her breath. She watches his own chest heave, the top of it flush. “It’s just... I have a bed. Unless you want the couch.”

“No, the uh, the bed’s good, if you’re sure…?” he gets out, sitting back on his knees as she rights herself, and then he’s throwing his feet back off the couch and onto the floor. “How do you want to—?”

“This is fine.” He hooks her legs around his waist, watching her carefully, and makes to stand as she winds her arms around his shoulders. Dick kicks her chair on the way up and hisses. “Careful.”

He makes a soft sound in the back of his throat as she runs her tongue along his bottom lip, and then one more guttural when she moves to the column of his throat.

They aren’t exactly graceful as they make it back to her room, though at least he has the decency to not simply deposit her on her bed like a barbarian. She shifts up toward the headboard, watching his eyes as he moves to follow, and she barely has time to take a breath before he’s swooping in to kiss her again.

“Wait,” he says, pushing back on his elbows, and then his hands as he looms over her. A flash of panic passes through her and he gets back to his feet. “One second.”

She doesn’t have much time to ask why before he’s darting out of her room, and she’s sitting up as he comes back on, wheelchair in hand before he pauses by the dresser.

“I don’t know where you want it.”

Barbara swallows and nods. “There’s fine—now come back here.”

He nods in kind and wastes little time in lowering himself over her again, her fingers knotted in his hair and his breath gathering at her lip just as she catches hers. She slips her tongue back into his mouth and then drags her teeth along his before their hips are flush together.

Her hand smooths down his back in time with the one sliding across her stomach, the transition of muscle from the atrophy in her legs to her torso, coiled in her arms and stomach, and she nudges him.

Dick’s fingers trail along her sides, her waist, sliding back to give her space as she sits up again. His eyes remain on her as she slips her shirt over her head, tossing it in the general direction of her dresser, and then finds them fixed on her chest as she pushes her hair back out of her face.

“Such a guy,” she mutters, and Dick’s gaze flicks back to hers, something darker and deeper than she’s ever seen in it, and a glint to the slant of his mouth she hasn’t, either.

“Such a bully,” he says before he’s climbing back over her and stealing her breath away with a searing kiss.

They continue on like that for a while, a tangle of limbs and occasional click of teeth, only breaking away in order to slip her sleep shorts off. Barbara goes to pull him back toward her, figuring all that’s left are Dick’s pants and a vague comment about a condom when he only gently nudges her to lie back down, slipping out of her grip.

She watches his slow descent from where she props herself up on her elbows, him leaving behind a string of kisses and trail of teeth before he makes it to the apex of her thighs and settles between them with a, “hang on.”

He sucks a mark into the gentle swell of her hip bone, and she tilts her head to watch as he runs his hand along her thigh, movements gentle yet thorough, even if she can’t feel it. His breath gathers at the waistband of her underwear, and she offers him a slight nod as he hooks his fingers through it.

“Christ, Grayson,” she murmurs, catching only the hint of a grin, though his eyes betray his humor. Dick keeps his gaze on hers as he slides her panties down her thighs, her knees, and she pays little heed to where they end up as he presses a kiss to the inside of her knee.

Part of her wants to tell him to get it on with it already, but then watches as he plants a series of kisses up along her thigh, each slow and methodical, his fingers mirroring him on her other leg. Something flares up inside her, like annoyance, as he draws attention to where sensation ends, but then he moves again. 

She’s still watching him and he her as Dick reaches up to part her legs, and with a sharp gasp from her he licks a deliberate strip up her folds. His next few moves are more tentative as he finds his groove, and he shifts one of her legs so that it rests over his shoulder before one of his hands trails up her stomach and then comes to rest against her breast.

“Oh god,” she gets out as he thrusts his tongue in gently, nose skirting against her clit. He moans before she does, the vibrations shooting up through her, and with a soft inhale she turns her head away, breaking his gaze as she covers her mouth with her hand.

His moves from gliding over her nipple to reach for her wrist and give it a tug.

“Don’t,” he says, moving away enough to ghost his breath against her clit and sending a shockwave through her. “Wanna hear you.”

She nods, numbly against the pillow, slipping her hand out of his grasp until their fingers are intertwined and she gasps. The sensation is… different, but that doesn’t stop Dick’s ministrations, and she glances down to find him looking at her in the dim light of the room, eyes dark and focused on her in such a way it makes her chest throb.

He’s still watching her as he slips a finger inside her, then two, bending them in time with his tongue on her clit.

“Um,” she says eloquently, closing her eyes and focusing, breath gathering in broken little gasps and soft moans, met with softer ones on his end.

“Yeah?” he gets out against her clit, and she has half a mind to grab the back of his head with her free hand.

“Shut up,” she murmurs, and his gentle laugh vibrates through her, brow pinching and fingers twitching. “I…”

Barbara makes a sharp sound in the back of her throat followed by a deeper, more guttural groan as her orgasm coils in her belly. Her back arches, Dick’s fingers and mouth still coaxing her through, and he squeezes back as her grip tightens on his hand.

Her next breath is more of an open-mouth pant, Dick pulling away slowly, slipping her leg back to the bed, and a pleasant buzz spreads just under her skin as she works to get her bearings back. She opens her eyes to find him working his way back toward her, mattress dipping beneath his knees as he crawls his way back up to her. He flops down beside her, fingers trailing up along her side, and even through his sweatpants she can feel his cock pressing against her hip.

“You okay?” he asks, and Barbara huffs out a laugh.

“You taking notes?”

“Should I?” Dick comes back with a grin, then sucking in a breath as she traces the backs of her nails across the skin of his stomach. “Uh.”

“Eloquent.” She loops her fingers into the hem and he just about hisses, hand still at her breast because of course it is. “You should probably get these off.”

Dick hums, scooting toward the end of the bed to leave his sweatpants on the floor, and he pauses long enough that Barbara thinks he’s changed his mind. She works at her lip and the sound he makes is something like a whine.

“Okay, I, uh, wasn’t really planning on this,” he says, and the look he gives her is one she can only think of as bashful. He even drags a hand through his hair. “I didn’t exactly bring any condoms with me.”

Barbara makes herself comfortable on her pillow again, glancing down at him and offering a hum of her own. “It’s fine, you don’t need one,” she says, hoping he doesn’t push it because that isn’t quite the conversation she’s in the mood for.

“Babs.”

“Dick,” she says, and as he looks at her it must get through because after a minute he only nods and moves to settle down beside her again. She watches, waiting, and even as she reaches a hand out to him and lets it glide down his shoulder nerves settle in again.

“Are you okay with this?” he asks. She almost rolls her eyes but can’t, because she’s been thinking the same thing, question dancing across her tongue before she bit it. Instead she moves toward him, shifting against the bedcovers, and her tongue darts out to wet her lip as she glances down between them.

“Are you?” she asks, and his eyes never leave hers as he nods. One of her hands snakes between them, smoothing over the plane of his stomach and ridges of puckered skin to palm him. Dick lets a breath out through his teeth, planting a hand on her waist and digging his fingers into the skin. He swallows thickly as she strokes him, smearing pre-cum along the length of his dick and she watches a muscle jump in his thigh.

“Unh,” is the gentle noise he offers, and she can’t tell if it was supposed to be a word or not as she strokes him again, this time met with him thrusting up into her hand. She could carry on like this alone, she thinks, watching him come undone in her hands. There’s a rawness to it, the realization bubbling up and pushing aside nerves in that this is a power she still wields, has never stopped wielding. Dick grunts into the space between her nose and upper lip, head bent toward her until their foreheads almost touch, and she traces a finger along one of his balls on her next downward stroke before she removes her hand.

“Barbara…” he trails off as she knots her fingers in the curls at the base of his skull to pull him toward her, and then with a tug at her thigh and another twist of his hips he’s inside her. He stills as she gasps against his tongue from where she’s licked her way into his mouth, and she can feel the tremor dancing up along his arm.

“Fuck,” she says, and he shivers as her grip tightens against his scalp. “Move.”

Dick doesn’t need to be told twice, clearly, because then he rolls until she’s on her back and hovers above her. As he does he shoots her a glance for permission, to which she nods before shifting her legs to settle between them, and then another glance when she tells him _no_ as he goes to place one over his shoulder.

“Sorry,” he murmurs, ghosting his fingers back down along her thigh, and Barbara raises herself up on her elbows to shake her head.

“No, no it’s fine,” she says. He settles himself between her thighs again, nodding as he slips back inside of her with a pleasant ache and stretch she hasn’t been able to achieve herself. “Next time; now I just want to do this.”

She tugs him back down with little complaint on his end, judging from the way his next kiss is all teeth scraping against her lower lip, pressed against her as if he can get any closer, and mutters _next time, huh?_ to himself with a thrust and a small grin she can hear.

“This is fine by me,” he says, leaving a string of open mouth kisses across her shoulder while her hands wander, exploring a patchwork of scars she knows stories to and those she doesn’t. She closes her eyes as he finds his rhythm, tilting her head back against the pillow as she loses herself in sensation, letting it wash over her as Dick noses at the side of her neck, breathing into the dip in her collarbone.

Her hands rove his body in desperate exploration, his torso and back slick with sweat and heat; fringe sticks to his temples as he moves to brace himself on his elbows and then his palms, and through hooded eyes she watches a myriad of expressions dance along his features.

“Fuck, Barbara,” he says, and she hums somewhere in the back of her throat, fingertips ghosting along the dips of the insides of his elbows and grooves along his forearms before pushing herself up.

Dick hisses as she drags her teeth over a nipple, his next thrust taking on an increased fervor. She repeats it with the other, tilting her head as she glances up, though her view of his face is blurred and skewed. His throat works and he makes that same beautiful groan he did earlier, a sound she takes great pride and pleasure in. Barbara carries on her ministrations, a survey of teeth and tongue, fingers following whorls of bullet and knife wounds as her other arm keeps her propped up. It’s a careful study, noting which motions prompt more of a response than others, and she licks a strip of salty skin from his sternum before making it to his throat.

“Jesus Christ,” he says as her teeth graze over his pulse point, snaking a hand beneath her to spread his palm at the small of her back and pull her close, deeper.

“Ah!” she gets out, fingers curling into his shoulder, and she pants against his neck, held there until her elbow starts to lose feeling and he follows her back down to the bed.

It’s meeting his eyes that truly takes her breath away, full of raw emotion and every he’s voiced and left unspoken; the magnitude of intimacy of it all leaves tears pricking in the corners of hers. Too many emotions to voice blossom in her chest, spreading down to her ribs like a sunburst, the feeling both warm and terrifying at the same time. Despite her attempts to blink them away, lose herself in the physical moment, Dick notices and his movements slow with a soft murmur of her name.

“Don’t stop,” she says, shaking her head and closing her eyes. His thrusts take on a different fervor, deeper, slower, and Barbara manages a gasp as his arm snakes around her back to encircle her, head ducked down to whisper into the shell of her ear.

“Barbara,” he gets out, and she can hear the strain in his voice, feel it in his arms. “Barbara.”

“Dick,” she returns in kind, one of her hands traveling down the span of his back and dragging blunt nails behind it before they dig into the skin of his ass. He chokes out a groan, his next few thrusts erratic, just for a moment, and that she finds some peace in, some satisfaction before he returns to his slower rhythm. He feels deeper now, reaching, a filling sensation that makes her breath catch as he holds her closer.

A thought betrays her that this isn’t just sex, that it means more, has always and would always, and she chases the thought away to focus on the here and now. Dick pulls back enough to slide a hand between them, the pads of his fingers seeking out her clit again. Her next breath comes with a choked inhale, her teeth pressing against his lip as he moves to kiss her and she to meet him halfway. Her next moan he swallows down and her hands wander to anchor her, one settling with her fingers splayed across his sweaty back, and the other caught in his hair.

“Barbara.”

It gathers in her, in the core of her very being, like every passing fantasy she’s never dared voice and more, and it’s everything she can do to keep her eyes open, fight to keep them on his as her orgasm breaks her apart and stitches her back together. There’s a look on his face she can’t discern, though that doesn’t keep him from moving, working her through it, and Barbara chases the last few traces of her orgasm as Dick keeps her grounded.

He slows, forehead against hers as she breathes, closing her eyes for a moment before looking back into his. She cards her fingers through the damp hair at his temple, letting it rest against the side of his face before she tilts her head to kiss him. There’s a tingling sort of ache in her, a twinge of muscle in her stomach and Barbara lets out a breath as he pulls away to breathe, maintaining his slow rhythm.

Barbara nudges his nose with hers and he chases after her tongue as she coaxes him to move again. Dick’s arm tightens around her waist and the other moves to her thigh from where it’s slid from his. He kisses her, one that’s short-lived and open-mouthed as she drags her fingers down the damp skin of his back again.

The noise in the back of his throat is something akin to a whine, a noise she swallows down as he pants into her mouth.

“Come on, Dick,” she says, voice little more than a murmur, smoothing a hand down his ribcage and Dick’s hips stutter against hers. He grunts, grabbing a fistful of the other pillow and ducking his forehead into the space between her neck and shoulder. Barbara winds an arm around his shoulders as his thrusts take on a disjointed fervor before he stills entirely, dragging a breath against her collarbone.

Her fingertips drum against his shoulder blade as he gets his bearings back, and in hindsight a condom wouldn’t have been the worst idea as he slips out of her. Dick pushes himself back on his elbows, and her palms glide across his skin as he moves off her, shifting to settle beside her again.

“Hey,” he says after she’s kissed him, and Barbara traces her fingers along his cheekbone, the slope of his nose, the curve of his lip and the easily missed scar at his Cupid’s Bow. He shifts to kiss her fingertips, and then he’s pulling away, picking his way across the dark bedroom and darker apartment in search of the bathroom.

Barbara sighs, stretching her arms over her head as she makes herself comfortable. That pleasant ache persists, one that comes with a small sense of pride, she isn’t ashamed to admit. A small smile tugs at her lips, and it’s still there as Dick makes his way back into the room.

“Thank you,” she says as he hands her the towel, and he grants her some privacy to clean herself up.

She lies back down, closing her eyes, and she can sense Dick hovering and debating even as he bends down to kiss her again.

“You weren’t planning on going back to the couch, were you?” she asks, opening her eyes to find him holding himself above her, one hand planted on the pillow. There’s that look again, one that involves more emotional depth than she’s ready for and she reaches up to tap a finger against his chin. “Promise you there’s no drool pillow.”

Dick smiles a little, and then he’s clambering over her and she rolls with him as he worms his way under the sheets. He stretches out, nestling into the pillow and bedding, and she laughs as he says, “Oh, this is so much better than the couch. I should have thumb wrestled you for it.”

“Mm, I’d say that was some wrestling of its own,” she says, to which Dick snorts as she pulls the blankets up to cover her chest. Barbara rolls over to face him, watching him the near-dark and residual glow of the clock face through the blinds. She reaches over to brush hair out of his eyes, Dick peeking at her through it as his hand curls around her hip.

“Maybe you should leave the bad puns to me, huh?” he asks. He drums his fingers on her waist. “You can have the great sex, I’ll keep the bad jokes.”

“Ha ha,” she gets out, but she’s already moving to meet him halfway and kiss him again. There’s a different weight to it, not nearly as frenzied, something slower and deeper, less poking and prodding and build up. The nerves have beyond subsided at this point, lost amongst the post-orgasm haze and compartmentalized to be dealt with later, when she’s ready. “Remember what I said about it getting late?”

Dick hums against her lip, moving to kiss her forehead and then her mouth again. There’s something unspoken, but she doesn’t want to ask. “Good night, Babs.”

\-- --

Dick wakes up shortly before she does, careful not to make too much noise, and she opens her eyes to find him sitting on the side of the bed with his back to her. There’s sunlight peeking through the blinds, slanting across the bedspread, and Barbara swallows and resigns herself.

“I told you we’d regret this,” she says, and Dick straightens, twisting to look back at her with a quizzical expression.

“Regret it? I’m only going to see how your coffee maker works,” he says and she’s silent for a moment, mulling over her next words, and he must pick up on more of her reservations because he only shakes his head. “I don’t regret anything… do you?”

Barbara gives a minute shake of her head, considering telling him it might be a one time deal, or it could be more, or it could be something she doesn’t have a name for yet.

He crawls back over the bed on his knees, leaning down until she can curl a hand around the back of his neck when he offers her a quick kiss. Barbara pulls him back down again, her teeth catching on his lower lip as he smooths his hand over the blankets, coming to rest at her waist. They kiss for a while longer, long enough something stirs in her belly. Her head tilts as he noses at her jawline and works his way down the column of her throat, pressing her back into the mattress.

“‘m not going anywhere,” he says, pressing a kiss to her collarbone. Dick pauses there and then rests his chin against her sternum as her fingers move to card through his hair. “Pancakes?”

“Pancakes?” she parrots, twisting her head against the pillow to look at him.

“Yeah, do you have stuff to make pancakes?”

“Dick, you don’t have to do that,” she says, shaking her head as he raises his.

“I know, I want to,” he murmurs as her fingers glide along his temple, and then down the side of his face along his cheekbones. Dick turns his head to kiss her fingertips as they descend along his jaw. He opens his eyes again to glance at her warily. “If… that’s all right with you.”

She watches him, Dick shifting against her with growing trepidation, and then her tongue darts out to wet her lip.

“Yeah, that’s. That would be fine.” 

The unease gives way to a grin, and then Dick’s crawling his way up her body to kiss her firmly, her opening her mouth to him as he tilts his head. Barbara makes a soft sound in the back of her throat as he pulls away and she catches the flush spreading along the top of his chest.

“Better get dressed,” he says as he gets to his feet, and it strikes Barbara then that he’s still fully nude as he goes to hunt around the floor for his sweatpants. There are scars crisscrossing his back, and she sits up to watch them span the curvature of his spine as the sheets pool around her waist. He rights himself, pants in hand, and stills when he looks over at her again, enough that Barbara barely withholds the urge to cover herself. “On second thought… maybe pancakes can wait.”

The sheer delivery almost makes her laugh, though her fingers still itch to drag the sheets up.

“Really?” she says, but she doesn’t chastise him, which he takes as an invitation to rejoin her on the bed.

“Yeah,” he says, hand coming up to cup the side of her face. “Like five minutes.”

“Five minutes? That’s it?” she laughs enough for him to slip tongue into her mouth, a quick dart against her lip and she hums, chasing the taste, morning breath or not. Dick follows as she pulls.

“Maybe longer than that.” He rests an elbow on her pillow as he settles over her, her fingers skimming down his body to his growing erection. Rather than make a move he only watches her for a moment; the slope of her nose and splash of freckles that curl around her eyes; the cut of her cheekbones and knowledge that she and her heart hold so much heartache and pain and joy, and the sheer amount of strength she possesses. “You’re beautiful, Babs.”

Spots of color blossom high on her cheeks, highlighting her freckles, and her gaze cuts away. “I’ve already had sex with you once and I’m about to do it again, no need to pile on the flattery. Even if you _did_ bring me wine and flowers.”

“It’s true,” he says, with more conviction than she thought possible with her hand so dangerously close to his cock again. “Barbara, you’re beautiful, and I…” The words are right there on his tongue, she can tell, pressing against the backs of his teeth, but he holds back whatever declarations of his rather than run the risk of driving her away again.

“Dick…” she starts, stuttering when his thumb circles a nipple and just about grins at her. He moves to settle between her legs again, tugging the sheets away and leaving both of them bare. Her fingers glide along his body, all the dips and counters, the scars and pockmarks and other defining features, a roadmap of his life against her fingertips. Her own words are there, too, but she swallows them back as Dick brushes hair away from her eyes. “I don’t know if I’m…”

Dick shakes his head minutely. “We’ll figure it out.”

Her mouth falls open as he slips into her again, enough her breath gathers against the bow of his lip before he kisses her again, and again, and again.


End file.
